Cavs can’t get it done on the road

Monday

Mar 24, 2008 at 12:01 AMMar 24, 2008 at 1:53 PM

Watch them at home and the Cavs look like they are headed back to the NBA Finals. They lock down on defense. They knock down big shots on offense. Then come the road games. Watch out. The defense cracks, the offense stalls and the Cavs stumble to losses.

Chris Beaven

Watch them at home and the Cavs look like they are headed back to the NBA Finals. They lock down on defense. They knock down big shots on offense.

Then come the road games.

Watch out. The defense cracks, the offense stalls and the Cavs stumble to losses.

“We just haven’t been able to get it done on the road and that’s concerning,” Head Coach Mike Brown said after Saturday’s 108-98 loss at Milwaukee.

Less than five weeks from the playoffs, the Cavs are riding a nine-game home winning streak and a five-game road losing streak. Overall, they have lost seven of eight away from home, and those road woes are trumping their success at Quicken Loans Arena.

“I’m worried because if we expect to be a very good playoff team, we got to know how to win on the road,” Brown said. “And for some reason it doesn’t matter who we’re playing, it’s almost like we just think we can show up and turn it on at the end of the game instead of coming out and playing the right way.”

Frequent slow starts have been a problem on the road. In five of their seven road losses since Feb. 26, the Cavs have trailed after one quarter. But they’ve also been ripped late in some games, and generally, they fail to set a tone on the defensive end.

The Cavs go from giving up just 85.6 points a night their last nine home games to yielding 103.3 points their past eight road game.

“That is scary, especially this late in the season,” Brown said.

Saturday, Milwaukee took a 27-14 lead after one quarter, getting a number of easy layups and open jump shots.

“We didn’t show any fight,” Brown said.

And it’s not like the Cavs are running into the ‘72 Lakers or ‘86 Celtics.

Outside of losses at Orlando and Boston, they have fallen twice to Milwaukee, in addition to Chicago, New Jersey and Washington. The Wizards have been surging, but the other three are well below .500. The Bucks and Nets each have won just three of their last 12 games.

Their lone road win in this stretch came in New York. And it took a 50-point night from LeBron James for the Cavs to finally subdue the woeful Knicks, 119-105.

“We’ve been a good road team in the past,” James said. “We got to a point where we were winning road games, and then we’ve just got to a point where we just can’t win one.”

True enough, the Cavs won eight of 10 road games before this stretch, which probably not coincidentally began after their Feb. 21 blockbuster trade.

Trying to fit in four new players while dealing with continual injuries makes things tough on any team. But the Cavs also began their nine-game home winning streak the day after the trade.

“At home, you have the crowd to keep you in the game,” Brown said.

On the road, it falls on the Cavs themselves to get it going.

“We have not shown the ability to do that as of late, which hopefully is alarming to not only myself, but to the rest of our team,” Brown said.

The Cavs look like they will be the fourth seed for the playoffs, so winning on the road soon becomes an imperative.

“In the postseason, we know we’re not going to have homecourt throughout ... so at one point, you’re going to have to win on somebody’s floor to continue to advance,” James said. “So we’ll figure it out. ... We have to win one (on the road), and just get the focus back going into the postseason.”

The Cavs are riding a nine-game winning streak at home and five-game losing streak on the road. One look at their defensive numbers points to why they are playing so well at home, but have lost seven of eight away from Cleveland.

Here’s a comparison of their home and road defensive numbers since Feb. 22:

- Allowing 85.6 points per game on 41.9 percent shooting from the floor in the nine home games.

- Seven of their nine opponents have scored fewer 90 points, including limiting Detroit to a season-low 73 points.

- Five of the nine have shot less than 40 percent from the floor.

- Allowing 103.25 points per game on 47.52 percent shooting in the eight road games.

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